The Comrade in White | Page 7

I may come back to you all. And I'll pray for you at the same time even if I'm in the thick of battle. Is it a bargain?"
I wish you had seen the dismay on those ten faces. It was any odds on their blurting out a shamefaced refusal, but Ted Harper, their acknowledged chief, pulled himself together just in time, and called out as the train began to move:--"We'll do it, sir. I don't know how we'll manage it, but we'll do our best. We'll not go back on you."
As Fenton sank into his corner he was aware of the mocking looks of his brother officers. "I say," said one of them, "you don't really think those chaps are going to hold a prayer-meeting for you every week, and if they did you can't believe it would stop an enemy's bullet or turn an enemy's shell. It's all very well to be pious, but that's a bit too thick." Fenton flushed, but he took it in good part. "Prayer's a big bit of our religion," he said, "and I've a notion these prayers will help me. Anyhow I'm sure my lads will do their part. Where Ted Harper leads, they follow."
And sure enough the boys did their part. It was fine to see them starting out in the wrong direction, and twisting and doubling through the crooked lanes till they worked round to the Mission Hall, and then in with a rush and a scuttle, that as few as possible might see. The doings of the Fenton crowd, as they were known locally, were the talk of the town in those first days after Roger departed. Would they meet? Would they keep it up? Would they bear the ridicule of the other boys of their own age? And how in the world would they pray?
Time answered all these questions except the last. They met, they continued to meet, they faced ridicule like heroes. But how did they pray? That mystery was as deep and insoluble as before, for whatever awful oath of secrecy bound them to silence not a whisper of the doings of those Tuesday evenings was divulged to the outside world.
I was the only one who ever knew, and I found out by chance. Ted Harper had borrowed "Fights for the Flag" from me, and when I got it back there was a soiled piece of paper in it with something written in Ted's ungainly hand. I thought he had been copying a passage, and anxious to see what had struck him, I opened the sheet out and read these words:--"O God, it's a hard business praying. But Roger made me promise. And you know how decent he's been to me and the crowd. Listen to us now, and excuse the wrong words, and bring him back safe. And, O God, make him the bravest soldier that ever was, and give him the V.C. That's what we all want for him. And don't let the war be long, for Christ's sake. Amen."
I felt a good deal ashamed of myself when I came to the end of this artless prayer. I had got their secret. I could see them kneeling round the Mission forms, two or three with crumpled papers in their hands. They were unutterably shy of religious expression, and to read was their only chance. The boys on whom the fatal lot fell the previous Tuesday were bound to appear with their written devotions a week later. This war has given us back the supernatural, but no miracle seems more wonderful to me than those ten lads and their ill-written prayers. And, remember, that liturgical service lasted six months, and never a break in the Tuesday meeting. What a grand thing a boy's heart is, when you capture its loyalty and its affection!
It was a black day when the news came. The local Territorials had advanced too far on the wing of a great offensive, and had been almost annihilated. The few survivors had dug themselves in, and held on till that bitter Tuesday faded into darkness and night. When relief came, one man was left alive. He was wounded in four places, but he was still loading and firing, and he wept when they picked him up and carried him away for first aid. That solitary hero, absolutely the only survivor of our local regiment, was Lieutenant Roger Fenton, V.C.
When his wounds were healed, and the King had done the needful bit of decoration, we got him home. We did not make the fuss they did in some places. Our disaster was too awful, and the pathos of that solitary survivor too piercing. But some of us were at the station, and there in the front row were the ten men of prayer. Poor Roger